Kara Mitchell and Sara-Beth Donovan Of Mintz + Hoke: 5 Tips for Your B2B Marketing Strategy

An Interview With Rachel Kline

Maximize event exposure. Brands invest time and money in events, but often scramble to activate, and omit critical pre and post phases. Want more meaningful conversions? Less waste? A highly aligned event strategy will make original investment stronger and more impactful than would broadscale campaigns.

The B2B marketing landscape is a complex and evolving space, with its unique challenges and opportunities. Navigating it effectively requires well-thought-out strategies and insightful tactics. With a myriad of digital channels available, what are the best ways to connect, engage, and convert potential business clients? As a part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing Kara Mitchell and Sara-Beth Donovan.

Kara Mitchell has been navigating complex strategic assignments for many Fortune 500 and 1000 companies for close to two decades. This includes everything from branding to repositioning and product introduction campaigns across rapidly changing industries like healthcare, financial service and defense. Kara has been with Mintz + Hoke, a Connecticut-based advertising agency, for 13 years, and serving as Principal of Client Service since 2018.

For over two decades, Sara-Beth Donovan has been creating integrated media programs that raise the bar and exceed client expectations while taking their media dollars further. From corporations to state agencies and consumer brands, she brings a strategic foundation to everything she does. Sara-Beth has been with Mintz + Hoke, a Connecticut-based advertising agency, for 16 years, and was named Principal of the agency in 2018 and President of the Media Only division in 2019.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share your personal backstory with us?

Kara Mitchell: I’ve always been fascinated by how humans think and act. That interest grew as I began my studies and was connected to consumer behavior and marketing. I began on a path toward a degree in psychology and ended up transitioning to business in order to expand my knowledge so as to combine psychology along with a marketing and macro/micro economic focus.

Sara-Beth Donovan: I was fascinated by media from a very young age. You would never find me without a magazine close by. In high school, I did a research project on the impact of advertising on the self-image of women — this was in the early 90’s, long before the current conversations still relevant to this topic and social media today. Unlike Kara, I stayed the course, completing my degree in psychology all while working in media through college. Marrying the motivations of people with the platforms that could shape and influence conversations became an obvious career path for me. Over two decades later, I learn something every single day.

None of us can achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful for who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Kara Mitchell: My grandmother is currently 102 years old. She was such an influential figure for me growing up and continues to be today. Born in 1921, she received a degree in nursing and became a public health nurse. She was a working mom when that was frowned upon. She never caved to the pressures of societal norms, and she created a home environment where we were expected to behave the same way. As a female in the business world, we often hear about the need to grow our confidence and resilience. But for me, those were never in question because they were norms instilled at a young age. We modeled our behavior after my grandmother and that’s allowed me to dream bigger than most are able.

Sara-Beth Donovan: As the saying goes, ‘it takes a village’ so there isn’t just one person. I have been so lucky to have strong mentors throughout my career. I am still personal friends with my very first advertising agency supervisor, and we work closely with one another. Relationships make work so meaningful, and I am so very lucky for the many I have retained for over two decades. I still tap these people regularly as trusted advisors across all aspects of life.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

Kara Mitchell: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” The golden rule. Throughout my working career I have often thought, how might I want to receive this or how would I want to be treated in this situation? This has helped me to lead with compassion and build trust, confidence and lasting relationships that have served me well throughout my career.

Sara-Beth Donovan: “Feel the fear and do it anyway” — Susan Jeffers. Fear can be a paralyzer or a great motivator. When you move through fear with success, the sense of confidence and accomplishment gained makes each new fear a little less scary.

Can you share with us three strengths, skills, or characteristics that helped you to reach this place in your career? How can others actively build these areas within themselves?

Kara Mitchell: Active listening, problem solving and emotional intelligence. In terms of how others can build these areas within themselves, I think it goes back to my life lesson quote of the golden rule. You have to look beyond yourself to take interest in others in order to hone your skills in these three areas. Place yourself in their shoes.

Sara-Beth Donovan: At a young age, I conquered my fear of authority figures, and this served me well as I quickly became comfortable in any room to speak my truth. Do the work and come prepared. And I invest every client dollar as if it were my own — and I can stretch a dollar! Each person will navigate their own path with their own strengths. That’s what makes work fun and interesting.

Which skills are you still trying to grow now?

Kara Mitchell: I have been successful at leading on more of a one-to-few level but I’m working now to understand how to build those interpersonal relationships at scale without sacrificing the things I find critical to building those relationships.

Sara-Beth Donovan: I’m constantly learning. Marketing and, in particular, media, is always changing. Staying current takes discipline and time. But beyond the specifics of my role, I am also working on attentive listening and team coaching.

Let’s talk about B2B marketing. Can you share some insights into how you perceive the current landscape of B2B marketing?

Today, many B2B marketers think about targeting their audience in terms of the role or function the audience is playing, and they forget that their audiences are people first and foremost. They have the same rational and emotional behaviors when it comes to buying as those of other consumers. And marketers tend to forget about emotional behaviors and keep their focus on the rational. Because of that, most marketers use digital tactics as a black box, casting a wide net and hoping the technology optimizes on their behalf. Then, there are marketers who recognize that doing the upfront work of understanding an audience and its dynamics creates an important framework to implement before building a plan. Just as we need to understand these dynamics and connect on a more personal level on the consumer side, we need to apply that same thinking to the B2B side. At Mintz + Hoke, we follow the Immersively Different philosophy — putting the customer at the heart of everything — as a guiding presence in the work we produce. This allows us to understand where our audience is and the pressures they’re buying under so we can best define the channels to engage them.

How have recent market trends and changes influenced your approach to outperforming competitors?

Trends come and go, and while we will adopt certain channels throughout our careers, before you can determine the channels to engage, you must develop a message that is going to speak to your audience. That trend will not change. Core to any well-thought-out strategy is an understanding of your audience, and that understanding needs to be on a more personal level. As the media world continues to become even more noisy with advertising opportunities, we must ensure we are building plans that address a diverse range of audiences with multiple touchpoints and messages at different stages of their journey. We at Mintz + Hoke pride ourselves on understanding the balance between art and science when it comes to building our media strategies for B2B audiences. Our Rule of Three philosophy marries paid, earned and shared media to outsmart, not outspend, the competitors for share of attention.

B2B buying cycles can often be lengthy and complex. How do you maintain engagement and nurture leads throughout the various stages of the buyer’s journey?

We know that buyers are conducting research both online and offline throughout their buying journey. We need to be sure that we are looking at all forms of media — paid, earned, shared and owned — as a way to deliver content to allow the audience to engage both online and offline. And the messages for that content need to align to the key care-abouts for the buyers at the different stages of their journey. For instance, in the earlier stages they are conducting their needs assessment and discovery, whereas in the later stages they may be looking for third-party reviews or endorsements. Throughout the entire journey, your website serves as a resource for the buyer to reaffirm that the messages you are delivering are in alignment with the information they are seeing.

Personalization is gaining prominence in B2B marketing. What are some ways marketers can effectively leverage data to deliver personalized experiences?

Delivering relevant content based on where someone sits in the journey to aid in their research process is a very effective use of personalization. It helps aid the research process that will naturally happen throughout the buyer’s journey. And given the increased presence of complex buying groups versus the 1–1 sale of old, the more personalized the content and sales materials can be to meet the entire organization’s business challenges, the better.

ABM has also gained traction for its personalized approach to targeting high-value accounts. What advice would you give to fellow B2B marketers looking to adopt this strategy?

There are different degrees of ABM you can deploy. If all you’re able to do today is merely start with some first-party data combined with lookalike profiles, jump in and gain some learnings. You can scale accordingly from there. The most important first steps are to begin thinking about ways you can capture or cleanse your first-party data and consider how you are going to fulfill the ABM campaign once it’s deployed. The campaign is only as good as your knowledge of your target accounts so upfront planning of the journey is critical to success.

What are 5 Tips for Your B2B Marketing Strategy to Help You Beat Competitors?

1. Bringing humanity to B2B. Core to any well-thought-out strategy is an understanding of your audience, and that understanding needs to be on a more personal level. Key motivations, concerns and comforts. The dynamics and pressures under which they are buying. Once you have this understanding, you are armed with what you need to develop effective messaging that speaks to your audience.

Story: We worked with a client who had recently acquired a line of suture products. Through research, we identified that their target audience did not view this product as a commodity. Rather, it was an important tool that finished off their surgical procedures and was core to the healing process. Net net, it was a reflection of their work. And so, they took pride in the suture they used, and there blossomed the insight for the campaign message that was developed — the stories behind the strands. Each strand of suture told a different story that connected to the procedures and patients on whom they were most often used. So the audience could connect to the suture product by seeing themselves and their patients in these stories.

2. Multiple media touchpoints to engage customers throughout B2B sales cycle. With a long B2B sales cycle, digital plays a role at many stages in the customer journey. Buyers start with digital research. Check in during the middle of their journey to validate info. And end the journey on the website to ensure all information aligns before converting to a sale.

Story: A recent manufacturing client was launching a new seamless flooring product for the medical community which was safer than traditional flooring. We needed to build multiple interaction points to move prospects along the journey. Scientific by nature, this medical audience would want to know this product was going to somehow advance care. We located research from medical journals that said healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) are actually spread through contamination on the floor whereas for years we believed it to be spread through hand-to-hand contact. We leveraged this research as starting point for the entire journey to help the audience create the need. We developed a whitepaper, made it available for download and pushed it out through a digital media campaign. We hosted webinars where people could register to learn more and shared more about how our flooring product prevented bacterial growth. We ran byline articles in leading trade publications and built out presentations for the sales teams which aligned this research with the product benefits. And for the final stages of the journey when our audience would return to the web for validation of our message, we shared third-party endorsements and a total cost of ownership (TCO) calculator tool. All these elements, online and offline, allowed our prospects to move through their journey with key engagement tools at each step along the way.

3. Outsmart, not outspend, competitors. The Rule of Three philosophy marries paid, earned and shared media for increased share of attention. As the media world continues to become even more noisy, this conversion ensures we are building plans that address a diverse range of audiences with multiple touchpoints and messages at different stages of the customer journey.

Story: Healthcare needs can strike in a moment, not a season. You will see many healthcare organizations rally around a specific healthcare month, such as October for Breast Cancer Awareness Month, with a myriad of campaigns, only to go quiet for the balance of the year. But this is not a diagnosis that happens in any given month. Healthcare needs are not scheduled. In working with our team of healthcare clients, we remind them that healthcare is a full-time messaging strategy. The only way to do this effectively on limited budgets is to blend an approach that can do triple the work. By aligning to patient stories in earned media, paid placements to drive elective engagement and shared social media for patient connections, we can be sure we are ever-present for our patients who need us while respecting the client dollar.

4. Holistic brand experience matters. Blend of digital and tactile elements — a well-thought-out dimensional mailer, audio such as radio or podcast, a custom-created event activation, a targeted outdoor campaign — makes a lasting impression and breaks through a crowded digital landscape.

Story: To reach businesses both domestic and international, our client, a state-based economic development organization, utilizes an integrated strategy consisting of highly targeted paid social media, tangible direct mail efforts and in-market activations. Bold design supports a bold message to help it stand out among a sea of sameness on paid social, while their direct mail campaigns rely on unique giveaway items and packaging that strike an emotional chord. Their in-market trade show and event activations include compelling draws such as university sports team mascots on-site, destination tours and wine tastings. These elements work in tandem to create an integrated brand experience.

5. Maximize event exposure. Brands invest time and money in events, but often scramble to activate, and omit critical pre and post phases. Want more meaningful conversions? Less waste? A highly aligned event strategy will make original investment stronger and more impactful than would broadscale campaigns.

Story: We’ve all been to conferences and trade shows with a packed agenda and not enough time to make all the connections we want to. If you wait to activate your strategy until you are in the room, you will never maximize your impact. Yet, by employing a pre- and post-show strategy to connect with attendees, you can take engagement to the next level. We align with show hosts to be sure we are reaching the right audiences in the right way. Markets are important to consider as well. What you can do in a major city may be different than what’s possible in a more remote venue. Regardless of the location or the theme, we build customized activation programs that run over a six-week period — not just the few event days — to return more for our clients.

How do you utilize data or AI to refine your B2B marketing approach, and what tools have been particularly impactful in gaining a competitive advantage?

When we are able logistically and from a budgetary perspective, we like to conduct primary research or audit first-party data to help inform our approaches. Even a few informal in-depth interviews can offer a look into the world of your audience and help inform your strategy. When that’s not feasible, there is lots of great secondary data available on the market to help glean insights into your audience. AI has supported the development of lookalike and/or predictive models which can help inform targeting strategies. And AI has aided in content fulfillment throughout the journey.

Which digital channels have you found most effective in reaching your target audience, and how do you optimize your presence across these channels to outshine competitors?

There is no digital silver bullet. Different audiences utilize different tools to achieve success. For one brand, social may be the perfect place to own the white space for a category if they are late to the party and other channels are saturated. For others, a highly structured content strategy that delivers email alignment with a leading industry publisher may position their subject matter experts at the top of the pack while also leading to earned media extensions. It is about knowing what your brand is trying to accomplish and designing the platforms that can best deliver. And always consider pairing digital with other media tactics for a more integrated brand approach that touches the audience at multiple parts of the sales journey.

Are there any underrated skills or qualities that you encourage others not to overlook?

Kara Mitchell: I often say assessing talent not just for their grades and performance in school is critically important. Rather, look at those who may have achieved average grades but worked hard for those grades. They may be ones who are more resilient and appreciate the value of hard work to achieve their goals.

Sara-Beth Donovan: Gut instinct. Business moves fast and someone who can trust their gut and move quickly without regret will likely get ahead simply by the act of moving. Even if that movement needs to result in a future pivot. Stagnation kills careers.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good for the greatest number of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.

Kara Mitchell: I would love to inspire a movement where we believe in the power to share the abundance we have acquired. Not to be forced to do so but to want to give back in whatever way each of us can — financially, through time, through knowledge — whatever it may be. But in this movement, we all believe in the power of paying it forward.

Sara-Beth Donovan: I have a strong passion for seniors and pets. I’ve always felt there must be a way to connect these two segments of community for great gains. Many seniors would love a pet but don’t feel they can provide the full-time care required. On the flip side, many pets sit home all day waiting for their humans. Both end up lonely for the better part of the workday. Well, let’s pair them up. There has to be a way and it would be so fulfilling to both sides of the equation.

We are very blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.

Kara Mitchell: I would love to have breakfast or lunch with Jeff Weiner. I would love to have a dialogue with him about compassionate leadership and continue to be impressed by his ability to prioritize human interactions but blend in the efficiency and effectiveness we all love in digital platforms.

Sara-Beth Donovan: I want to share an Aviation Gin cocktail with Ryan Reynolds. His instincts for business and what the market will respond to fascinate me. His successes beyond the big screen to spirits, sports and even my world — advertising — are so impressive. I would just love to pick his brain a bit.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.